Easier
by TMBlue
Summary: Ron is back. Hermione struggles to forgive him for leaving her without so much as a goodbye... DH missing moments. Written for the lovely wordsmithsonian.
1. Chapter 1

_**A/N:** This story was written for and is dedicated to the lovely **wordsmithsonian **for her birthday. She is a wonderful writer and friend and I hope you will all read her stories. They are brilliant! xoxo_

_ And just so you know, there will be a few more chapters to this story coming up in future! _

_Also, check out the song **"Not Miserable"** by **Frightened Rabbit** (_http:/www . youtube . com/watch?v=6NjTVkCnFO8_ - remove spaces). After finishing this story, I went out in the dark and listened to this song. I hadn't realized, but it had been stuck in my head before, and I think it may have subconsciously been the inspiration for the title "Easier". The song's tone fits perfectly with the story, I think. Anyway, I hope everyone enjoys it :)_

* * *

**Easier**  
_for wordsmithsonian  
_  
He didn't say goodbye. He just _was_. And then he _wasn't._ And she had to look at the empty spot he no longer occupied. Every day. Every heart wrenching day.

But then he had the nerve to reappear... He was gone. And then he was back. And that empty space was now full of... _something_...

She sat by the tent entrance. She could hear someone bustling around inside, but it was _her _night watch still. So whoever it was, they should be in bed sleeping, readying themselves for the next shift... because she sure as hell wasn't going to stay out here in the cold all night by herself.

Ron's face appeared, and somehow she had known it would be him.

He sat next to her. She felt her muscles tense up immediately, back rigid and stiff as she tried to remember how to be Hermione - in control and fearless. What had he taken with him when he'd abandoned her those long weeks ago? She felt the gaping hole that still remained - every day, she felt it - though she could no longer remember what used to fill it... not exactly... And maybe that was why she still sat rigid in his presence, like he could break her if she let her guard down.

"Hi," he said softly, timidly, as if testing the waters without knowing their depths.

"You should be in bed," she said stonily.

"Yeah," was his only vague reply. She shifted uncomfortably as she waited for another beat to pass, another moment, terrifyingly wordless.

The silence stretched like a rubber band, endless before her gaze as she tried to focus and refocus her eyes on the dark woods beyond. Before _he'd_ arrived and ruined her concentration, she'd been able to see at least a dozen feet into the murky blackness. Now, her eyes begged for readjustment, somehow feeling the distraction the same way that the rest of her body and mind had felt it... the moment she'd smelled him arriving.

"We're supposed to fight. Makes it easier." He shifted against the dead, frost covered leaves beneath him, tucking his knees up under his chin.

"You'd like that," Hermione whispered, her sigh caught in a visible transparent cloud on the cold night air, her small, jarred bluebell flames glowing faintly, briefly reflecting off the smoke of her frustration. But the puff of air, proof of her words, died in front of her purple lips.

She cupped her jar in both hands and stared into it. She'd have no luck seeing into the darkness now, after staring at something so bright. Her night watch was already compromised by Ron's presence anyhow, distraction unavoidable as she listened to his cold, ragged breathing. No use trying to save herself...

She felt his discomfort, and it made her smile... a sad, lonesome smile that was reserved only for herself and her thick, un-brushed hair where it fell on either side of her face, blocking her view of him... but also _his _view of _her_. Just the way she wanted it. For now.

"You know," she began, sensing her own change of direction, unable to stop it, "when we, Harry and I... when we packed up camp and left, the day _after_..."

She paused meaningfully and tilted her head up, the forest beyond now fully in her sights again, though dark and forbidding like she couldn't remember seeing it in quite some time. It felt like a mystery, and one she wouldn't soon solve...

"I really thought," she continued, and she felt his eyes on her, though she didn't dare turn her head right to see him, "I thought for sure I'd die before I ever saw you again."

"No!" Ron yelled instantly, as if the thought was too horrific to allow him a chance to form any other words, and he shifted again, and she could make out the shape of him out of the corner of her eye as he faced her fully.

"I really did! What if you'd come back finally and found us dea-"

"Stop!" Ron shouted, and she thought she could hear his voice echoing somewhere in the distance as she flinched. "Please..." he begged, his voice soft and terrified now.

"I'm sorry..." she mumbled, and she caught him twitching his head left to right. He didn't want her apologies. She knew that. He felt he didn't deserve them...

Finally, Hermione chanced a full glance in his direction. His eyes were wide but soft somehow, glistening in the moonlight. They resembled glass orbs, and her mind went to Harry's Prophecy for some bizarre reason. She shook her head very slightly, overwhelmed by his gaze and his freckled hands pressed to the frozen ground on either side of his crossed legs.

She opened her mouth to say his name, but it died somewhere in her throat, stuck there as it had been for weeks. When she'd finally been able to release it, it had felt rough and unfamiliar. Now, she knew that if she said it _here, _in the dark... _alone _with him... she'd start to forget why she wasn't supposed to be entirely pleased with him. And she wasn't ready for that... not quite.

"You can go inside," Ron finally said, and Hermione only just realized how long they had been sitting there in the darkness, staring at each other... wordless. It must have been minutes like that. She blushed, though it could have been the cold catching up to her, an excuse she had to cling to so she wouldn't imagine him noticing what he had done to her... what he'd done with his gaze, those blue eyes that seemed enhanced a bit by her bluebell flames as he scooted closer to her.

She cleared her throat.

"I still have fifteen minutes," she said rationally, glancing at her watch.

"Go to bed. I'm up anyway," he said gently, his voice a bit scratchy. What had changed? Had she... somehow been responsible for the way he was carefully avoiding her eyes? And did his cheeks seem a bit... _flushed_... too?

"Are you sure?" Hermione asked.

"Positive," Ron nearly sighed, turning his head to look at her one more time. And he lifted the corner of his mouth just enough to destroy her.

"O-Okay..." she stammered as she stood.

"Your lips are purple," he commented as he watched her brush frost from her jeans.

"It's freezing," she said reasonably. "You should... keep my bluebell flames. They really help your hands."

Ron nodded and she turned towards the tent entrance, her heart pounding impossibly fast all of a sudden. But she heard a rustle again behind her and felt his eyes on her back.

"Hermione?" he called, and, standing in the tent entrance, she turned around to face him again where he remained seated several feet away from her. And there it was, confirmation that he still retained his old, familiar power over her.

"Yes?" she inquired distantly, though not impatiently.

"I just wanted you to know..." he began, looking _up _at her for once in his life, "even if you don't forgive me, I'm just glad to see you again."

She felt her body relax a bit, heart still beating furiously, though a cold wind blew suddenly and rocked through her, creating a series of uncomfortable muscle spasms in its wake. But he was looking up at her with his big, round eyes, her bluebell flames still dancing softly in the jar at his side. She opened her mouth, and she allowed her next foolishly unguarded words to float free.

"I'm glad too, Ron," and she took a step back, her heart melting, as she knew it would, at the specific way that her lips finally formed his name... like she had never felt anything more beautiful in all her life than the simple act of moving her mouth in the correct way... to address him directly. He was still alive and she could see him and hear him and...

She shivered again, though the wind had stopped now.

"Goodnight." She turned, and he was no longer with her.

Just how she expected to feel. Just how she had grown accustomed to. Exactly what she wanted to forget and... _forgive _even.

But now... he was home, in a sense, and that was always going to be, above all else, the reason why she was still breathing. Still hanging on.

It would have been easier to fight to their resolution. It was what they were used to. But there was something much more beautiful in doing things the hard way.

She climbed into her bunk, shut her eyes, and smiled her first genuine smile since he had left her. Her unshed tears asked a simple question... whether they would be allowed to come out again tonight. And she answered with a hesitant, yet very clear, _no_.

Not this time.


	2. Chapter 2

_**A/N:** Happy one year LJ / friend-anniversary to my lovely **wordsmithsonian**! I hope you enjoy this second installment! xx_

_Also, as a sidenote, I listened to **Radiohead's "Exit Music (For a Film)"** for the duration of writing this chapter. That's my new thing to do, apparently, listen to one song on loop while writing a story!  
_

* * *

**Chapter 2**

She was used to sore muscles, stiff beneath taut skin, bones pressing through from malnutrition. So when she twisted her foot stepping through the thick brush around their tent, she simply rolled her eyes and hobbled inside.

Frozen air did little to ease her pain, and she sat heavily in a rickety chair in front of the rough wood table, littered with papers and books and maps... research, none too helpful, but all somehow necessary, a slog they had to press through in order to see what could be on the other side...

She heard a low cough from somewhere behind her, from the opposite side of the tent canvas, and she would recognize the timbre of his voice anywhere... a cough, a whisper, even a sneeze. And she shook her head as she sighed, smiling sadly as she rolled up her jeans leg and tucked down her sock, pressing cold, mittened fingers to her tender muscle.

"You okay?" he said, and she jumped in her seat, startled at hearing him so desperately close behind her. She couldn't even bring herself to turn towards his voice, knowing she'd find his bright blue eyes on her, forehead creased, staring down at her and reading her mind...

How had he gotten so good at moving without a sound?

"Fine," she said icily, rubbing her thumb over her ankle, wincing as she pressed against the worst of her injury.

He cleared his throat, unnerving her as he remained behind her, out of sight.

"Stop lurking," she demanded, tightening her shoulders in anticipation of his movement around her, when she'd see him at last.

"Sorry," he mumbled, hands shoved into his pockets as he shuffled to stand in front of her, too far away. His thick plaid jacket hung over his thin torso but hugged his broad shoulders tightly, and she had a moment of irrational contemplation... what it would be like to be buried, cozy, inside the warmth of his clothing.

She blushed as she let her hair fall around her face, eyes on her ankle where it was crossed over her knee, exposed.

She heard him swallow and chanced a glance up at him again, curious. Deep creases ran down between his eyes, above his nose, pink from the chill outside. And following his eye line, she knew he was assessing her injury for himself, unable to ask about it again for fear of her snapping back. And the worst part was that she knew she would.

She returned to her task, wincing each time she hit a particularly knotted bit of muscle. She tried so hard to ignore his gaze, but she felt burned through at the intensity of it, and it was soon impossible to go on. Her head whipped up and she glared at him.

"What do you want, Ron?" she asked sharply.

"Nothing," he said softly, meeting her eyes.

She held her breath.

"I heard you behind the tent when you..." he gestured vaguely towards her ankle, "and I wanted to make sure you were okay."

"Well, I'm fine," she said slowly, intending to maintain the rough edge of her own voice, but failing as her lips parted, as the grip of her hand against her ankle slackened.

She felt tortured, tormented, by his sadness and remorse. She was almost angry with him now for his lack of passion, any chance of conflict smashed to nothing when he'd apologize at her whim, shying back from her when he feared he'd gone too far.

"Why are you being so nice?" she asked frustratedly, knowing after she'd said it that it wasn't right. If she really examined it, she thoroughly welcomed this new nerve-inducing way he addressed her, his concern and absorption within the knowledge of her well-being coming as a pleasant, heart-fluttering revelation. But it was the guilt and subsequent penance that had become his whole being that weighed on her, that strained her day to day with the effort to ignore it.

"Don't you want me to be nice?" he asked scratchily before clearing his throat.

"I don't know," she said truthfully.

She watched him swallow, focused on the hollow of his neck peeking out from the top of his shirt.

"I don't know who you are," she complained, returning to her ankle and avoiding whatever reaction he might have to her words. Good or bad, it was going to be too hard to deal with now, with him so close, with his scent wafting towards her as he breathed - freshly washed hair, earth on his skin... a smell that somehow encompassed warmth and comfort though there was no real way to explain it.

"It doesn't work so well like that," he said finally, and she looked up again, confusion drawing her into him though she'd otherwise have avoided it.

"What are you-"

But her words caught in her throat as he stepped closer.

"Rubbing your own muscles, doesn't really work," he clarified, chest sinking with a heavy exhale.

"Well, what do you suggest?" she asked impatiently, wishing him all at once further away from her and _much _closer towards her.

"Let me?" he asked, and she detected the tiniest shiver as he removed his hands from his pockets, pale fingers against his trousers.

She looked up at him, as wary of his touch as she was thrilled to imagine it.

"It doesn't mean you've forgiven me," he said softly, and she caught the left corner of his lip twitching up into a tiny grin.

She exhaled slowly, and with him so close, with a glimpse of the Ron she knew before rising to the surface here in the middle of something close to hopelessness, she had no chance of resistance.

"Alright," she said, "give it a go."

He licked his lips and sank to his knees in front of her, suddenly level with her. She pressed her spine against the back of her chair, trying not to tremble as he stretched his fingers and reached for her foot.

His freezing skin touched her warmer ankle and she flinched. He removed his hand and looked into her eyes apologetically.

"Cold?" he asked, and she nodded, unable to speak. "Sorry," he said, bringing his cupped hands to his mouth and blowing hot air onto them for a few seconds as she watched, mesmerized.

He reached tentatively for her again, and this time, when he touched her, she felt nothing but electricity through her veins.

"Better?" he asked, and she nodded again. He moved his thumb over her skin, rippling against the pulled muscle beneath, and she wasn't sure if she regretted her decision to let him do this or was rejoicing that she'd been too tired and entranced to turn him down.

She watched his jaw twitch, and was it possible that he was nervous too?

Of course he was, she reasoned. Was he allowed to do this? Even though she'd said it was alright, it didn't feel like permission. It felt like some kind of step, like he'd crossed a boundary somewhere. And when he spoke again, she sensed it was out of the need to distract himself and possibly her as well from the intimacy of skin against skin, no onlookers to keep things distant.

"Once, when I was little," he began, "I pulled a muscle in my shoulder working in the garden with Mum. So we came inside and she sat me down and massaged it for me. Fred and George wouldn't stop teasing me about it. But she told us how it doesn't work if you try to do it yourself, like if you tickle yourself and you don't feel anything really. It's just better when you can't anticipate everything, when you don't know it's coming... and when you can't feel the result."

His eyes were so focused on her foot that she had a hard time paying attention to what he was saying. Though his voice soothed her as she listened, comprehension was another thing, and she had to force herself to work at each word, connecting them into the story he was telling.

This was important. Something about this moment. She had to remember, hold onto it now because...

Why, really? Because she feared it might be the last time? Because what if they died and this was it? Because what if she was letting life pass her by, anger and still-fresh wounds of his departure preventing her from having what she needed?

She winced as his fingers pressed down a bit too hard on a particularly sore spot, and he shot her another one of his apologetic grimaces before returning, more gently this time, to his task.

It felt incredible. He was right. So much better than her own small hands against her own skin. But then that could have been because...

She was so scared to admit it, even to herself. But...

Truth, she decided. Might as well.

_Because she needed him. Because she loved him._

And at that moment, it was just them. Just his hands on her and his voice filling the air between them. Just his comforting scent merging with her own at his proximity. And nothing else needed to be what it was.

Was she allowed to feel this way now, after what he'd done?

"Fred and George came up with a tickling jinx just to spite her," Ron continued, and Hermione closed her eyes, submitting to her senses. "You can set it on yourself and it actually works. Of course Mum was their first test subject. I've never seen her laugh so hard while trying to hex something at the same time. She was furious. But she couldn't stop laughing."

She opened her eyes again and watched him grin, remembering.

It was the first time she'd seen him really smile since he'd come back. Selfishly, she found herself wishing she'd been responsible. But that was insane! She was still angry. She still hadn't forgiven him... had she?

Story concluded, he seemed to realize what he was still doing, and his fingers paused against her skin before pulling away from her altogether.

"See? Better, right?" he asked, eyes boring into hers.

"Much," she whispered. "Thank you."

He stood.

How she wished he wouldn't...

It had grown quietly colder and darker since he'd entered the tent after her. And a gust of howling wind ripped through the half-open tent flat. Ron slid left to block the gust with his own body, shielding Hermione as she shivered. He backed towards the opening, chest heaving as he stared down at her.

What could she call this, what was happening to them?

All these jumbled moments when maybe things should have been different, when it was too confusing to be called perfect... but it somehow _was _anyway.

He turned away from her to tie the tent flat shut against the wind, and she watched him for a moment before rolling her ankle, testing the way he'd healed her. She turned up her sock, turned down her jeans leg, and stood, moment diffused as Ron stuffed his hands into his pockets again and cleared his throat.

"I think you're catching cold," Hermione said gently. "You've been coughing at night."

"Have I kept you up?" he asked, and she shook her head quickly, wishing desperately that he'd wipe every single ounce of apology from his face again, that he'd grin down at her and joke with her, even fight with her.

He'd been right. It would be easier. So much easier.

"I just thought you should take some cough suppressant with your tea," she said, and he nodded.

"Okay, I will."

And now, there was nothing more that needed to be said, and in the presence of unnecessary lingering, gazes too long and meaningful, she _heard _her heartbeat double. Knowing deeply that he'd leave her, she wished she could bring herself to beg him to stay. But her mouth was too dry and tears still too fresh.

He nodded and passed by her.

"I've got first watch," he said, and she turned to observe him as he pulled a blanket off the back of the couch.

He passed by her again, and she had an overwhelming urge to lean in his direction, hopeful that he might brush up against her, but he didn't. He untied the tent once more and slid through, careful not to let in too much cold air in the midst of his departure.

But she stepped in his direction.

"Wait."

He looked up, eyes on hers, motionless.

"I just want you to know," she whispered. "I'm going to forgive you."

His eyes grew marginally wider. His lips parted. And she caught his hand trembling against the tent canvas.

"Really?" he questioned, awed, voice hardly a whisper.

"Ron?" came Harry's voice from outside the tent. And everything crumbled.

"Yeah," Ron said, stepping backwards, eyes glued to Hermione for as long as he could manage. She turned away first, listening to his footsteps crunch through the leaves as he joined Harry outside.

Skin tingling, she removed her jacket and methodically prepared for bed. But by the time she sat on the edge of her bunk a few minutes later, she was far too absorbed in her own jumbled thoughts to notice Ron returning until he was mere feet away from her, hand outstretched, offering her a bunched up quilt.

"Oh!" she gasped, alarmed.

"Sorry, didn't mean to startle you," he said gently. "I warmed this up for you."

His cheeks were red, ears burning in the low lantern light.

"What..." she breathed, shocked.

"By the fire," he clarified. "It's really cold tonight. I thought maybe you'd like..."

He shrugged, and she took the quilt quickly, just as she sensed him second guessing his own actions.

"Is that too nice?" he asked, and she submitted fully to her relieved grin as she looked up into his eyes, her own eyes glistening with unshed tears.

He smirked at her, and she laughed, hugging the warm quilt to her own chest.

He ran a hand through his hair as she shook her head. And Harry stepped into the tent behind them, though he could have been miles away.

"Goodnight, Hermione," Ron said as he pocketed his hands, the gesture alerting her to how often he'd done it... and she suddenly wondered if he had gloves at all or had lost them somewhere between his departure and return.

"Take my gloves!" she said irrationally as he stepped back away from her, and he quirked up an eyebrow.

"My hands are way too big."

"I've cut holes in the fingers and they're much too large for me anyway," she explained, cheeks burning.

His eyes searched the table next to her bed, landing on the gloves.

"You'll regret it when I stretch them all out and you can't wear them at all anymore."

"No, I won't," she said as he picked them up and wiggled his hands into them.

"Not bad," he said, holding his hands up for her inspection. Her heart fluttered up into her throat as he smiled. "Thank you."

She nodded. He turned. And seconds later, he was gone.

She covered herself in the quilt he'd brought for her, remembering how he'd taken it from the couch earlier and curiously wondering if he'd planned everything out from the start.

She stretched out on her bunk, encased in warmth. And she turned her head to face the tent opening, imagining she could see him outside, fingers poking through the ends of her gloves, fringe falling into his eyes.

And she couldn't wait to forgive him.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

She was scraping mushrooms together again, for soup. It was tiresome, always knowing that there was little she could actually do to cook anything better for them than thin, slimy bits of fungus, soaked in fire-heated water. She'd added a few dandelions this time. Miracle she'd managed to find them at all, given the continuing cold weather. But she had, and it had made her feel some small ounce of relief at being able to offer something that, at the very least, would not taste exactly like yesterday's food... and the day before... and the bloody day before that...

Ron walked up behind her and lightly cleared his throat. She knew he wanted her to turn around, but she would not indulge him. She was _busy_, after all.

"What, Ron?" she asked, scraping bits of freshly chopped mushrooms into her cupped hands.

"How'd you know it was me?" he asked, sounding far too skeptical. She rolled her eyes, though he could not see her, and she dumped a large handful of mushrooms into a pot of steaming water to her left.

"I always know," she said, simply and cryptically, having no interest in getting off subject. He'd come here for a reason. Let him spit it out, already.

He sniffed lightly before walking closer, almost cautiously. Of course it wasn't as if he'd been playful with her lately. Perhaps he'd tried. But she'd responded much less than enthusiastically. Though she'd let her guard down, she wasn't about to just go back to how things were. Not yet, anyway.

"I found something I thought you could use," he started, and she finally did turn around to face him, to see what he was referring to.

He was holding a small bundle, something wrapped up in what looked like his pillow case.

"What is it?" she asked, softly, as she closely studied him untying the fabric at the top and opening it for her to see.

"Wild asparagus! And there was a patch of clover a few yards outside the perimeter," Ron exclaimed, excitedly. "Mum once told me you could eat those, clover. I'd uh, had a few when I was three or four, and Fred and George tried to convince me I'd die from them, so Mum set them straight..."

Hermione's eyes widened as she looked inside the case, noting Ron's dirty fingernails - he'd been out foraging for her. She knew Harry had been reorganizing their notes and paperwork across the tent, through the kitchen flap. And... so what, then? Ron had done this, alone, all for her?

"Lucky," he went on, "but yeah, it's bound to taste better than just those measly mushrooms and boiled water."

And suddenly, she was no longer softly moving closer towards him, heart melting at his gesture.

She was borderline furious.

She knew, on some level, that it was wrong of her, that her completely out of balance schedule and diet had made her snappy and moody, more so than she would have ever been, even given what he'd done... given that he'd _left_her. But she could just as well stop herself now as she could find and kill Voldemort all by herself, this very night.

"Measly?" she gawked, chest heaving as she took a step back from him, watching his smile disintegrate as he stared down at her. "How many times are you going to act like such a prat over what I'm cooking, Ron? ! I spend hours - _hours!_ - trying to find enough dandelions to alter the taste so you won't think it's just the same rubbish we've been having, so you... so you won't _leave again_!"

His eyes widened significantly and she watched his ears flush lightly as he visibly swallowed. She was hurting him...

"Do you think I _enjoy _this? Is it all still just a bloody stupid game to you? Oh, we're out here for a laugh, is that it?" Tears welled her eyes as her cheeks burned with rage, increasing as she continued to shout, mounting in a way that she could not suppress. "I can't do any better, Ron! Don't you think I want to be able to? I hate the way you save all of your words to me for these ridiculous, shy little chats, or for complaining that I'm not making you happy!"

Unshed tears had built to an irreversible stage, and her eyes burned as he blurred out of focus through salt water. But she could make out the image of him tossing his pillow case full of plants to the table carelessly, stepping a tiny bit closer.

"Hermione," he said, so soft and scratchy, as if he'd been crying himself, already. "Do you think I really left because of sodding mushrooms and dandelions?"

She shut her eyes from him and allowed her tears to gush free, rolling in hot patterns down her cheeks, off her jaw. She felt his body heat nearly encase her as he stepped a bit closer. She could feel the tension between them, how cautious he was of breaking her.

"I wanted to _help _you," he said, voice cracking slightly. "I never meant to offend you. I wasn't saying what you do isn't good enough. Of course it is. You're far more clever than I am. I was afraid you'd tell me all of what I brought back wasn't edible for some really complicated and life-threatening reason that I'd overlooked because I never really paid attention in herbology..."

She wiped at her face, eyes still clamped shut. He was being too nice. Fight back, damn it.

"Are you going to look at me, at least? Have a proper row?" he finally said, voice floating towards her from too close now...

She opened her eyes and tried to glare at him, little puffs of unsteady oxygen flowing to and from her lungs too quickly for her to properly take them in. But as she met his eyes, he almost seemed to be literally knocked off balance. His whole face softened before her eyes, and his brow slanted with such sadness.

"I was so effing wrong to go. I'll apologize for my whole life if it means you won't stop letting me come around you," he sighed. "Are you tired of hearing me say it yet?"

She couldn't move, frozen to his words and to her spot here in the middle of the tiny tent kitchen.

"I need to tell you exactly why I left, and I will… Soon. I know you can't understand it really until I do. Even then, it's not ever going to be an excuse," he explained. "I know that. But I never want to hurt you again. I would never have left you if I'd been in my right mind, if I really thought you would care. I don't _think _that way, at least not anymore. You've got to know that. I'm not Draco bleeding Malfoy..."

She held her breath as she imagined all of the things that were too difficult for him to say, the things he'd held back from her. And what did Harry know that she hadn't yet been told? She'd suspected more had happened there, at Ron's return. She'd suspected that while the locket had something to do with his departure, that some other, much deeper running thread of year after year after _year _had built to a breaking point, sent him flying away from her with no clear logic or reason.

But he'd _had _a reason, hadn't he?

"What's happening to us?" she nearly whispered. "Everything's so difficult between us." And he licked his chapped lips before jerking his eyes away from hers and blinking too rapidly.

"Do you want me to leave you alone?" he asked, breathing shortly through his mouth and staring off at something to his left as he waited, so impatiently, for her reply.

"Am I supposed to?"

"You're supposed to want whatever you want," he said, and she might have laughed if she hadn't been falling apart.

He wanted to be good for her. And how had she not noticed before how insufficient he had seemed to be in his own eyes? She'd cast everything he'd done in a negative light, a place from which he had never come in the first place. He was here only to show her he cared.

"I'm not going to say everything that I want to say," she sniffed, and she could feel bits of ice chipping away from her heart as he visibly trembled. "I'll wait, until you've told me the truth, the rest of why you left. But Ron..." and her tears re-doubled at the sound of her voice and his name, mingling together, "I cared _so _much. I missed you more than I could ever explain. Every day, I begged for you to come back, even though I never said your name. Even though you couldn't have heard me."

"Maybe I could have," he interjected, shoving his hands into his pockets again, a gesture she now recognized as not only something to avoid the cold but a sign of shyness and awkwardness over this new territory. "Heard you when you _did _say my name at last, didn't I."

Her lips quivered. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see his discarded pillow case full of unwashed plants, hastily picked just for her. He removed his left hand from his pocket, scratching the back of his neck for something to do. And she couldn't take it any longer.

In one swift movement, she burrowed into him, hugging him tightly under his arm, wrapping her own arms around his waist as he gasped and tensed at her touch. She pressed her chest to his warmth, just beside his furiously beating heart.

And, at last, he relaxed, all through his body, as he dropped his left arm around her, suddenly clinging to her with a relieved sort of intensity. And she closed her eyes as his other arm learned what to do, wrapping solidly around her and holding her against his chest as tightly as he could without squeezing her breath away. She cried out her own relieved sob, closing her eyes and sucking in such a deep, refreshing breath of him. She felt his head duck over her own, and then, his nose was buried in the top of her hair, and she was sure she could feel his own tears wetting their way through her thick curls.

Things _could_be easier. Couldn't they?

He felt strong and alive and warm and perfect. And she fit so wonderfully against him. She'd wanted his touch, craved it more than oxygen. Why could she not have this, just _this_, in the midst of so much chaos and fear and uncertainty?

He was showing her that she _could_. If only she'd let him.

When finally she pulled back from him, her arms were stiff from being positioned for such a prolonged moment around him. And he seemed much the same, muscles locked from holding her so tightly. He was smiling as she looked up at him, eyes drooping as if drugged. He breathed deeply, and she brushed her hair away from her face, only mildly embarrassed for him to see her skin surely so blotchy and reddened with crying over something that now seem quite trivial.

Cynically, she knew he'd seen her at her worst, and that this was most definitely not her worst. But optimistically, he didn't seem to give a damn. In fact, he almost seemed glad to be there with her through her worst, if that made any sense at all…

As a piece of her hair fell away from her ear again, he reached up to fix it, staring intently at it as his neck moved with a small, nervous swallow. She felt her heart stop and soar away from her as his fingertips brushed her jaw before he dropped his arm to his side again.

They stared into each other's eyes. She couldn't break away from him. She felt that nothing in the world could ever-

The rustling sounds of Harry working across the tent sent a spark of logic back in her direction. The mushrooms were soaking themselves to pieces behind her, and they had too much work left to do.

"Ron, thank you," she whispered, as he rubbed at the side of his face, across several days worth of stubble. "I mean it."

"For what?" he breathed, giving her a beautifully lopsided smile, and she couldn't help but grin back up at him.

"Grocery shopping," she teased, glancing towards his pillow case of plants.

"Make me a list next time," he grinned back, tension melting completely away from his features now, and she felt light with the knowledge that he was no longer burdened by her hurtful words from before.

She laughed before reaching for his pillow case, shuffling the plants around inside.

"Well," she puffed, "don't just stand there. Find a small bucket and fill it with water and get to washing these."

He laughed in return, nodding.

"On it," and he set off.

And over her shoulder, she glanced to watch him remove his wand from his back pocket, taking small, familiar pleasure in listening to his spellwork, noting the way his trance-inducing voice caressed Latin before her eager ears.

She was going to forgive him alright. Very, very soon…


End file.
